A turbine engine, such as a gas turbine, generally includes a compressor section that produces compressed air. Fuel is then mixed with and burned in a portion of this compressed air in one or more combustors, thus producing a hot compressed gas. The hot compressed gas is then expanded in a turbine section to produce rotating shaft power.
The turbine section typically employs a plurality of rows of rotatable blades. Each of the rotatable blades has an airfoil portion and a disc portion by which it is affixed to a rotor. Since these components are exposed to the hot gas discharging from the combustors, cooling these components is of the utmost importance. An air separator for a gas turbine is a device for guiding cooling air from the compressor along the rotor to find its way to the turbine disks and eventually to the various rows of rotatable blades. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,151,881 and 7,815,415 disclose air separators in a gas turbine engine.